Is it really worth hoarding all the loot you find?

By level 49, I have collected hundreds upon hundreds of various items during my quest. I have accumulated so much loot, in fact, that I need to use 6 barrels in Riverwood to categorize my wide assortment of stash, each one heaping full with armor, weapons, gems, jewelry, potions, ingredients, ore, ingots, magic books, scrolls, and other miscellaneous items that carry a good sell value. If I were to follow through with my plan and sell off everything I have, I'd easily walk away with 50k+ in gold. There's just one small problem...

...no merchant is rich enough for my patronage =\.

In fact, I don't think all the merchants in all of Skyrim combined are rich enough.

I know there are perks I can get that allow me to sell a wider range of items to vendors that would be otherwise uninterested and perks that will put more gold in the vendors' pockets, but no perk will give me the edge I need to completely liquidate my inventory.

What is one to do? Simply stop collecting loot since no one in Skyrim can afford to buy it?

Solution 1:

I sell as I loot. The merchants seem to get more cash every day or so. So if I have a big haul I sell what I can and I keep a special chest just for stuff I know I want to sell. So if I have a day in town I do nothing but hang out at the pub drinking, or spend crafting or something, I go back to that chest and sell more the next day.

Plus you can trade instead of sell, buy soul gems or alchemy ingredients or such that will always be useful.

Of course at nine barrels of loot you are way behind. Fast travel to vendors in each city?

Solution 2:

fellow Skyrim hoarder!

First, you want to move all that stuff to your own house in Whiterun. The barrels are not guaranteed safe in the long term. There are numerous chests and other storage items, including bookshelves, end tables and sacks.

You can gradually liquidate your stock by selling little at a time, and fast travelling between towns to sell your junk. Shops eventually recover their gold, so sell a little of your junk every time you visit the city. Buy everything you can first, because that'll increase the seller's current money, so you can sell more things.

Another trick is that some shopkeepers (such as the alchemist shop in Whiterun) also give skill training. Money you spend on training goes into the seller's current funds, which lets you sell a lot more.

Some stuff is useful, so it's worth hoarding. Alchemical items can be used to craft hundreds of potions in one go and max out Alchemy. All those ancient Nord swords can be enchanted in one sitting to raise Enchanting, ingots to make weapons, and so forth.

Stop picking up truly useless items, though. Especially ignore junk with a high weight to value ratio and no use, like embalming tools and tankards.

When you're high level and have a lot of gold, you'll run out of things to spend it on. At this point, stop bothering with low-end items like steel or orcish swords. Ignore anything unless it's useful or worth a lot.